Bart Schultz

Senior Lecturer in Philosophy

Director of the Civic Knowledge Project

Chicago Uiversity (USA)

Placido the Sidgwickian—Remembering Placido Bucolo

 What vivid memories he left us, and what blessings they are. Erudite, insightful, kindly, generous, gracious, cosmopolitan, enthusiastic, humorous, caring, creative, cultured—somehow his expressive face and manner conveyed it all quite effortlessly. He was easy to like; he was easy to admire. 

 My direct personal contact with him helped reassure me that the large part of my life devoted to the study of the Victorian era philosopher Henry Sidgwick had not been wasted. Placido, following on his work on Pareto, had developed a passionate interest in Sidgwick and was engaged in a very serious effort to familiarize Italian academics with Sidgwick’s larger significance. Somehow, in part thanks to the intervention of senior Sidgwick scholar Jerry Schneewind, our long distance correspondence grew into a collaboration and an invitation to visit the University of Catania, at which Placido had orchestrated, as only a true maestro could, “Omaggio A Sidgwick”—the first of a series of international conferences (all with stellar casts) devoted expressly to the life and work of Sidgwick. Travelling to Catania with my wife and young daughter in November of 2006, I had little sense of the overwhelming experience that awaited us. 

 The conference was perfectly brilliant, as were its later iterations, and Placido was the brightest of stars. The volumes of conference proceedings speak for themselves. But the experience was profoundly amplified by Placido’s extraordinary hospitality and the time spent with him and Gillian, his equal in graciousness, at their home on the slopes of Mt. Etna. The warmth of the occasion, shared with the wonderful Roger Crisp who had come in from Oxford, set a new standard for what it means to host an academic conference. The thoughtfulness with which they handled everything, from accommodating my celiac condition to allowing my very young daughter to join us at a performance of Don Giovanni at the famous Catania Opera House—she was spellbound by it, to the astonishment of the adult company—was so deeply moving I can scarcely recall anything even vaguely comparable, in my academic life. Trips around Catania, to Syracuse, and to Taormina filled out the visit in such memorable ways. Driving back down the coast from Taormina to Catania at night, with rivers of lava flowing down the slopes of the erupting Mt. Etna off to the west, and Placido educating us from the driver’s seat, frames him in my memory forever. 

 On balance, he had the right approach to Sidgwick, and to life. He was open to and curious about all the dimensions of Sidgwick’s life and work, the arguments of The Methods of Ethics, to be sure, but also Sidgwick’s practical ethics, politics, and religious struggles, his spiritual quest, manifested in his lifelong devotion to parapsychological research. He was struck by the lines on p. 508 of Henry Sidgwick, A Memoir: “Well, I myself have taken service with Reason, and I have no intention of deserting. At the same time I do not think that loyalty to my standard requires me to feign a satisfaction in the service which I do not really feel. I am conscious of hankerings after Optimism, and if I yielded to these hankerings, I really think the haven of rest that I should seek would be the Church of Rome, just because of the insistence on authority ... There seem to me only two alternatives: either my own reason or some external authority; and if the latter, as my own reason would have to be exercised for the last time in choosing my authority, I should not hesitate to choose the Roman Church on broad historic grounds.” I had to relate to him that in one of my copies of this work, a copy that had been owned by Sidgwick’s 

 Cambridge student, friend, and colleague James Ward, there is an annotation in the margin by this passage with the single word “absurd,” a sentiment that many of Sidgwick’s academic philosophical admirers would probably endorse. Wrongly, it seems. This was a very mature, fifty-three year-old Sidgwick giving voice to what had really been a lifelong spiritual quest and frustration with the limits of reason. Yes, he wanted Reason to win. But he never thought that it had, and the depth of his thought about that failure and how to deal with it was part of what animated Placido’s interest in Sidgwick, to his lasting credit. 

Roger CRISP

Uehiro Fellow and Tutor in Philosophy 
Professor of Moral Philosophy

Faculty of Philosophy

Saint Anne’s College Oxford (UK)

Henry Sidgwick died in the final year of the nineteenth century. Interest in his book The Methods of Ethics – seen by many leading thinkers as the greatest ever work in ethics – continued for some time but then went into decline. In the second half of the twentieth century, partly because of John Rawls’s recognition of Sidgwick’s significance, work on Sidgwick picked up pace, and I myself was introduced to the Methods by Derek Parfit. After I had been studying Sidgwick for about a decade, I was contacted by an Italian scholar, Placido Bucolo, from the University of Catania, who himself had found his way into ‘Sidgwick Studies’ through historical and theoretical work on Vilfredo Pareto.

 Placido and his wife Gillian used to visit Oxfordshire each summer, and every year Placido and I would spend many hours discussing Sidgwick and his philosophy, usually in my college room. We shared a deep interest in Sidgwick’s views on religion, and their relation to his ethical theory. Sidgwick ended the first edition of the Methods with one of the most pessimistic sentences in the history of philosophy. Having failed to find a way to reconcile the impartial demands of duty with the patent reasonableness of self-interest, he concluded that ‘the Cosmos of Duty is thus really reduced to a Chaos: and the prolonged effort of the human intellect to frame a perfect ideal of rational conduct is seen to have been foredoomed to inevitable failure’.

 In later editions, the gloom lifted a little, and Sidgwick allowed the possibility that natural science itself might rest on certain fundamental propositions which ‘seem to rest on no other grounds than that we have a strong disposition to accept them, and that they are indispensable to the systematic coherence of our beliefs’. Perhaps ethics could also rest on such a ground, Sidgwick suggested, and then the question arises what kind of ground Sidgwick had in mind. Given that Sidgwick had already tried (and failed) to find an argument for God that might reconcile duty and self-interest, both Placido and I were convinced that it was theism that Sidgwick had in mind in speaking of these fundamental propositions. The difference between us lay in Placido’s firm belief that Sidgwick was indeed a theist, and my sense that he remained an agnostic. Placido had much evidence on his side, including passages in the letters, and converted me to an agnostic view on Sidgwick’s agnosticism. This amused both of us, and we thought the great philosopher himself – famous for his ‘Sidgwickedness’ – would have enjoyed the outcome of our debates.

 Placido went to extraordinary lengths to organize two World Congresses on Sidgwick, funded generously by his university. The first, perhaps unsurprisingly, was on ‘Happiness and Religion’, while the second covered ‘Ethics, Psychics, Politics’. Edited volumes on each were produced. They were outstanding, and their being fully bilingual (thanks in large part to the painstaking work of Placido’s wife Gillian) enabled much fruitful interchange between Anglophone and Italian scholars.

 The conferences themselves were hugely enjoyable. Placido and Gillian were wonderful hosts at their beautiful villa on Etna, and – as another old friend, Bart Schultz, describes in his memoir – Placido proved an outstanding tour guide, knowing not only the most interesting historic and scenic sites, but also the best places for lemonade and ice cream.

 It seems only appropriate that Placido was from Etna. He had a fiery intellect, from which ideas would explode unpredictably and with great power; and his enthusiasm and love for Sidgwick, for philosophy, and for other human beings flowed from him like lava. I shall continue to think about those ideas, in the hope of becoming less agnostic. And I shall never forget my friend Placido and the times spent in his company.

Giuseppe ACCOCELLA

Professor Emeritus of Law Università degli studi di Napoli “Federico II”

Rettore Magnifico della Università “G. Fortunato” di Benevento 

Vice President of the National Council of Economics and work

Director of the l’Osservatorio sulla legalità dell’Istituto di studi politici S. Pio V di Roma

Placido Bucolo

Placido mi è stato amico, io gli sono stato amico. La nostra conoscenza si realizzò e rafforzò nel periodo – a metà degli anni Novanta del secolo scorso – nel quale vissi il triennio di straordinariato nella prestigiosa Università di Catania, presso quel monumento austero e ricco di storia che era il Monastero dei Benedettini. Lì potei godere della premura e dell’amicizia dei filosofi morali che facevano di quella catanese uno dei centri di studi più autorevoli, come testimoniavano figure come quella di Paolo Manganaro (al quale debbo la chiamata in quell’Ateneo, per la mia vita accademica così importante), e quelle di Dollo, Pezzino, Bucolo, Coniglione, Romeo, Raciti. 

       Con Placido il rapporto fu affettuoso, basato per me sulla ammirazione delle sue doti umane, della sua disponibilità, della sua buona disposizione verso il mondo e verso il prossimo. Credente di profonda convinzione, mi chiamava, anche dopo il mio trasferimento da Catania a Napoli, per intessere conversazioni intensissime sulla fede, sul destino del mondo, sempre segnate dal suo ottimismo e dalla sua gentilezza d’animo.

       Aveva sviluppato un profondo interesse per l’utilitarismo inglese (la Gran Bretagna costituì la sua seconda patria, ed inglese era la moglie che aveva portato a Catania, capace di condividere con lui tutto il bello e tutto il brutto della grande civiltà siciliana), del quale indagò autori e correnti che restano prova significativa della sua operosità scientifica. Della sua ricerca restano testimonianze significative, ma qui vorrei soffermarmi su due assi che ne segnavano l’attenzione culturale e la passione per la comunità. 

   Il primo è il suo costante, profondo studio dell’etica sidwickiana, che lo portò a organizzare Convegni internazionali di grande significato (ai quali mi onoro di aver partecipato). Si pensi al volume, Introduzione a Sidwick (Catania, CUEM,  2005) che resta, a mio avviso, lo studio più completo e approfondito del pensiero etico-sociale di Henry Sidwick, al quale seguì, due anni più tardi, il volume collettaneo AA.VV., Henry Sidgwick. Happiness and Religion (a cura di P. BUCOLO – R. CRISP – B. SCHULTZ), Edizioni dell’Università di Catania, 2007, che ne consacrò anche a livello internazionale la fama di studioso.

          Il secondo asse è costituito dal suo profondo convincimento della missione dello studioso, dell’impegno civile dell’intellettuale che deve rendersi conto della realtà del suo tempo e farsene indagatore. Profondamente immerso nella cultura siciliana, sapeva cogliere con passione ed arguzia gli elementi di drammatizzazione presenti nella vita sociale siciliana, riconosciuti come segno di comprensione del costume della sua terra. Insieme ai Lyons di Catania Bellini – ove era impegnato convintamente - promosse il seminario di cui pubblicò, sollevando significativo interesse, gli Atti. Il volume AA.VV., La drammatizzazione nella storia e nel costume del Meridione (Adrano, 1997) è la prova di una attenzione alla vita civile e alla realtà sociale della sua Sicilia che sapeva coniugare l’amore per la sua terra con la razionalità profonda coltivata con i suoi studi.

        Placido appariva sempre sereno e alfiere di ottimismo, pur velato da una malinconia  pensosa sulle sorti umane. Mi fu amico, gli fui amico.

Giovanna BARBA

Associate Professor of Moral Philosophy at Facoltà di Lettere e Filosofia of Università di Catania, Placido Bucolo organized, for this Università, several international congresses. The first, on L. T. Hobhouse in 1968, which saw the partecipation of Morris Ginsberg and in 1972, another on The Language of Morals by R. Hare, who attended himself and in 1984 again on Ginsberg addressing his On Justice in Society . Meanwhile, in 1980, he dedicated a congress to the Italian liberal Vilfredo Pareto. 

 Nevertheless “…the reference author for Bucolo” was Sidgwick. In 2005 he published Introduzione a Sidgwick, introduced by Giuseppe Acocella as “the accomplishment of a long and constant itinerary of studies, as well as of a relentless attendance of Sidgwick’s work…”. Bucolo got closer to the English pfilosopher, not only for his liberal position, but also for his anti-dogmatic and rational theism. Man should be free to act in order to pursuit his own happiness, but, happiness, as a merely satisfaction of a temporary desire, should be got round superato for a longlasting and totalizing happiness in concordance with that of the others. That is possible enlisting ricorrendo to “a hypothesis logically necessary”, which is God. An “act of faith” which for Bucolo is absolutely necessary today more than ever.

 To this purpose, he organized two International Congresses on Henry Sidgwick. The first “Henry Sidgwick Happiness and Religion in two part (November 2006 and May 2007)  and the second “Henry Sidgwick Ethics, Psychic, Politics” in 2008 joined by authoritative international scholars.

In the first congress participants debated, above all, on sidgwickian theism as factor of harmonization between egoism and benevolence now and Roger Crisp evaluated this event positively because it aimed to rediscover this issue.  

Mariko Nakano-Okuno faced the question with a comparison between Sidgwick and Kant that underlined as for both without the postulates of “the existence of God” and of “a moral order in the universe… cannot make full sense of his or her moral behavior…” However, the scholar didn’t consider essential a complete rationalization of morality.

 The position of John Skorupski was, on the contrary, more pessimistic. He said that if the choice between believing or not in God depended on individual will, mainly selfish, the possibility of a ‘divergence’ between “own good and universal good…is only too obvious.” Nevertheless, he considered that ‘convergence’ was plausible for each theists like Sidgwick. 

In fact, for Bucolo, even in the moments of deep crisis, he didn’t fall into scepticism, but he went on to believe in “the indestructible and inalienable minimum of faith which humanity cannot give up because it is necessary for life” until the end of his life. 

 Bart Schultz agreed with him and congratulated for the organization of the conference calling it “a very sidgwickian inspiration.”

The second congress dealt with different relevant themes of Sidgwick’s philosophy and “concentrated its attention on the multiplicity practical hypothesis held together by the unity of morals that cannot make any distinction between public and private, past and future, here and there, me and others”

In effect, Daisuke Nakai said that Sidgwick tried “to construct a practical philosophy which would systemize all departments of human society on the basis of a flexible Utilitarianism » and Roger Crisp, Robert Shaver and Anthony Skelton seemed to be agree. As a matter of fact, neither the Common Sense Morality, which guided man’s actions only in some circumstances, nor Intuitionism, with its abstract and self-evident principles, respected the four sidgwickian conditions, ‘Clarity’, ‘Reflection’, ‘Consistency’ and ‘Consensus’. 

 In spite of analogies between Sidgwick and Kant and Mill, Philip Schofield argued that Sidgwick had many common points of view with Bentham and that his critic to Bentham was born from a misunderstanding. Actually, even though Bentham gave to ethics a rigorously systematic structure organization construction in order to develop a ‘strategy’ for encouraging individuals “to do their duty…Ultimately, however, Sidgwick seems to think that, without God, no strategy could be entirely successful.”

 In effect, although  Sidgwick couldn’t provide evidences of the existence of God, not even through the foundation of the Society for Psychical Research in 1882, “what really counted for him was “the living presence of God as an ideal guide to encourage, heal, and sustain man in his essential, existential uncertainty.”

Hortense GENINET KUS

Doctor in Philosophy Université de Reims Champagne Ardennes - France

In memory of a good friend, a great Professor and a wonderful person

 I think I came into contact with Placido Bucolo through Bart Schultz. Well I don’t remember if Bart told me to contact Placido or if it was Placido who sent me an email. I know that if Placido were here he would remember exactly how it went. Anyway, I got invited to the second Congress dedicated to Henry Sidgwick at Catania University in 2009.  I was quite surprised and didn’t know what to do at first, but then I wrote the paper and had many exchanges with Placido, and came over to Catania.

 One thing that surprised me at first was that although he had neither seen me in a picture nor met me, he was waiting for me at the airport without holding up a sign, but we found each other, and he just said « I knew it was you ». I was impressed. Then the second day we had the conference, I lectured for the first time ever as I still had not finished my doctorate. It was a great experience, and I stood up to his expectations. I looked so young that the students didn’t believe I was one of the speakers. This was one of Placido’s many qualities: help as much as possible people he believed should be rewarded for their merit. I was very proud to be one of them.

 Placido was very kind and took me to visit Taormina, for an ice cream and then a great lunch in a restaurant with two of his students/assistants Giovanna and Francesca. We spoke Italian, French and English. Well, he would always write to me in Italian and wanted me to write in French which I did. This resulted in nice exchanges, with few misunderstandings. Then I was invited to his house in the country and met his wonderful, kind gentle and talented wife Gillian. She was so sweet to me, and when I left she very nicely complimented me on how adaptable I was and ambitious in what I wanted in life. As I was, and probably still am, not very self confident, it really warmed my heart.

 I created a website, at the time, dedicated to Henry Sdgwick and a Facebook page which still exists. Unfortunately the website is gone, as there was a problem with the host and all the files are lost. Anyway Placido and Giovanna corrected the Italian version of the site. In order to work well Placido invited me to two other conferences during which I met Giuseppe Accocella, Rob Shaver, Roger Crisp and Philip Schofield, whom I am very happy to have met and with whom I had very interesting philosophical exchanges. I am very happy we can honor Placido’s memory through everyone’s beautiful recollections. I can say that Placido was a philosophical father to me, and that he, Gillian and Angela, were and still are like family. Thank you very much every one for your participation!

 E grazie mille Placido per tutto!

Mariko NAKANO-OKUNO

Assistant Professor (P), Dept of Medical Education , School of Medicine

Associate Scientist (C), Center for Clinical and Translational Science (CCTS) , General Clinical Research Center-Univesrity of Alabama (USA)

In Memory of Professor Placido Bucolo  

May 17, 2022

Passion for Truth, Faith, and Respect

 My encounter with professor Placido Bucolo was brief, and it was all online – all we did was exchange emails. However, he made a lifelong impact on me, on two accounts.  

 Placido is the one who welcomed me into the international scholarly community. My contribution to the second  World Congress on Sidgwick (“Sidgwick and Kant: On the So-called ‘Discrepancies’ between Utilitarian and Kantian Ethics,” in: Bucolo, P., Crisp, R. and Schultz, B. eds. Henry Sidgwick: Happiness and Religion, Catania University Press, 2007) was my first publication for international readers. Before that, all my works were written in Japanese, including a 1999 monograph on Sidgwick and contemporary utilitarianism. When Placido happened to shoot me an invitational email in 2006, my academic career had been disrupted due to family obligations and my relocation from Japan to the United States. As my one-year-old twins were too small to leave behind, I could not attend the Congress in Italy in person, but Placido still encouraged me to contribute an article. Had he not reached out to me at that time, I may not have gone on to restart my career in the United States and publish a more solid scholarly work on Sidgwick in English in 2011. It was a reassuring experience that Placido cared simply about the substance of my arguments, not my career status, gender, or academic affiliation. I will forever appreciate his generosity and pure interest in my work on Sidgwick. 

 Another lingering influence he had on me was how to view the place of Theism in ethics. Through email communications, we had long, heated debates about whether Sidgwick believed in Theism. Placido said Sidgwick did. I dissented, contending that one of the best parts of his Methods of Ethics is that he never appealed to the slightest hint of religion to make his arguments cogent. While Sidgwick did, with his closing remarks in ME and through activities of the society for psychical research, seek to find out if there is any chance of the existence of an afterlife where benevolence and rational prudence can be harmonized, such research must have been done out of his genuine interests in the nature of our life and ethics, not out of his confidence in the existence of God (which may be why he called it “research”). Even if they had somehow verified the existence of some supernatural phenomenon, that might not necessarily prove the existence of God as we commonly understand. That was my initial reaction. Placido and I discussed relevant passages in Sidgwick’s Methods of Ethics, Lectures on Kant, and Memoir, and he sent me a series of email attachments, including a photocopy of multiple passages from Sidgwick’s letters to his friends (Memoir, 227-8, 346-8, 559-560, etc.). Placido pointed out that these passages indicate Sidgwick believed in Theism. I pointed out that these passages articulate that he was not sure whether he believed or merely hoped so and that he did not think the existence of God could ever be proven. Placido responded that because it cannot be proven, we believe. His overall stance did not entirely convince me. However, this debate made me remarkably more open to appreciating different approaches to life and ethics so long as they ultimately lead to people’s overall happiness through different venues. In my short piece on Sidgwick’s Theism, I claimed that Sidgwick did have a solid affinity for Theism but that should not be stressed too much. This is because “What is no less important is the fact that Sidgwick manifested his theistic belief mostly in his private correspondence and rigorously refrained from introducing his personal belief in (or hope for) God into his systematic argument of ethics” (Nakano-Okuno, M, Addition on Theism, ibid., 2007). This was the fruit of our enthusiastic conversations, for which I owe Placido a lot. 

 Even though we were adamant on our partially different takes on Sidgwick, Placido and I were both happily respectful of each other’s deeply held thoughts and beliefs. I am sincerely grateful for that and wish that Placido’s intellectual legacies will continue being loved by many who have had the chance to feel his warm and cherishing presence during his lifetime.

Philip SCHOFIELD

Professor of the History of Legal and Political Thought

The Bentham Project-Faculty of Laws-University College London

Placido Bucolo: An Appreciation

 All students of the history of utilitarianism will forever be in the debt of Placido Bucolo for his pioneering work in reinvigorating the study of Henry Sidgwick, who, after Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill, is regarded as the third of the great classical utilitarians, and yet who, in comparison of his two predecessors, has, to use a familiar academic cliché, been sadly neglected. I became involved with Placido’s Sidgwick project after he had already edited and published, along with Roger Crisp and Bart Schultz, one substantial volume of essays - in English and Italian - on Sidgwick under the title of ‘Proceedings of the World Congress on Henry Sidgwick: Happiness and Religion’. Placido invited me to contribute an essay on Sidgwick and Bentham for a second volume, which was eventually published as ‘Proceedings of the World Congress on Henry Sidgwick: Happiness and Religion’. The invitation also involved presenting a paper at the University of Catania, staying at Placido and Gillian’s villa, and sight-seeing in Sicily.

 The visit to Sicily, which took place in March 2010, was short but it was certainly memorable. With his customary thoughtfulness, Placido met me and my fellow paper-giver Roger Crisp at the airport, where we were also joined by Hortense Geninet (now Kus), and were transported to Placido’s extraordinary home. I say extraordinary both because of Placido and Gillian’s extraordinary hospitality, but also because of its location. Looking out from one side of the villa, there was a view of the Mediterranean Sea, sparkling in the spring sunshine several miles away, and looking out from another side, there was a view of the smouldering Mount Etna (at least that is how I remember it, though it was a dozen years ago). I will never forget opening the curtain (or was it a shutter?) to my bedroom on the first morning I stayed there and being stunned by the view of Mount Etna. We then spent a wonderful day sightseeing, in gorgeous weather, including a visit to the slopes of Mount Etna and to the Greek amphitheatre at Taormina, before heading off to the University of Catania to present our papers to an impressively large audience in a cavernous lecture theatre.

 Later that summer I was invited to spend a day with Placido and Gillian at their cottage at Adderbury, just outside Banbury. The party was joined by John Skorupski, and I recall the delight with which Placido took us to the local St Mary’s church and his discussion of the finer points of its architecture with John, while I listened in and tried to look as knowledgeable as possible. I quickly came to the realization that there was no such thing as an idle moment with Placido, as I spent a good part of the day editing the English version of  some of the papers for the second volume of Sidgwick essays, which, as it turned out, ran to well over 800 pages.

 My contact with Placido was relatively brief , but I hope that these few words capture what I soon came to realize were some of his qualities - namely his scholarship, his energy, his enthusiasm, and his kindness. In short he was a true gentleman. The stimulus that Placido gave to Sidgwick studies, and to utilitarian studies more generally, will be enduring.

Robert SHAVER

Professor of Ethics

Dept. of Philosophy

University of Manitoba (Canada)

I’d heard—I can’t recall how—that someone who lived on Mount Etna had hosted a Sidgwick conference, and planned to host more. This seemed like something out of a James Bond movie (at least by the standards of Sidgwick academia). I hoped for an invitation. 

 An invitation arrived—I think Roger or Bart were involved. I flew to Catania. I arrived, late from too many bad connections, jet-lagged, with misplaced luggage. Placido—no doubt having had to wait a very long time at the airport—whisked me away. We talked about Sidgwick’s late sympathy for belief in God; Placido took this paper from the Memoirs much more seriously than I had. 

 He and Gillian were the perfect hosts. (I recall Gillian giving me a hot water bottle when I went to bed the night I arrived, and Placido giving me careful instructions on where to safely run on the mountain the next morning.) Placido seemed tireless in showing us Catania, and, later, Syracuse and Taormina, all the while keeping up non-stop conversation, not only about Sidgwick, but also about topics of the day (U.S. healthcare, Islamic terrorism, the Italian university system...). At the conference itself, he translated my paper as I read it; I recall being surprised at the passion with which some of the other speakers delivered their papers, though Placido himself seemed to have a (comparatively) more Sidgwickian reserve. 

 What struck me most about Placido was that he seemed so at home in his world and so happy to show this world to another. I think this is rare nowadays, especially for those at universities, at least in North America—almost everyone is from somewhere else. Placido gave the impression of being exactly where he wanted to be and always had been. I met him only for that visit, but I had the impression of a life very well lived. 

Anthony SKELTON

Associate Professor

History of Ethics, Normative Ethics, Practical Ethics

Western University of Canada

In Memory of Placido Bucolo

 Placido Bucolo (1941-2022) was a dedicated Sidgwickian, a proud Sicilian, and a deeply sympathetic man. He will be missed by all who loved him and had the benefit of his warm and spirited friendship.

 I first met Placido in May of 2010 when he invited me to lecture as part of the Second World Congress on Henry Sidgwick that he organized at the University of Catania in Sicily. Participation in the Congress was an honour and one of the highlights of my career. Placido was a great admirer of Sidgwick and his work in organizing the Congress and then publishing (with Roger Crisp and Bart Schultz) the highly valuable proceedings of it helped to introduce Sidgwick scholarship to a broad philosophical audience within Italy and beyond. We Sidgwickians owe Placido a great debt of gratitude for his labours.

 Participation in the Congress was no small affair. On the contrary: it was an event. It included an opportunity to lecture to a large audience of students and scholars at the University of Catania and to argue with Placido (in my case) over whether it made sense to compare and contrast Peter Singer and Sidgwick (as my paper did) and over the best way in which to solve Sidgwick’s dualism of practical reason and the role God plays (if any) in that solution. In arguing about the dualism, I got to know Placido as a philosopher; he was a formidable intellectual combatant. 

But an invitation to the Congress was not only about advancing Sidgwick scholarship. Like Sidgwick, Placido loved culture and history. An invitation to the Congress was perhaps above all an opportunity to be introduced to the many things that Placido cared deeply about, including his lovely home on Mount Etna, its rich history and its connection to his family (and – shock and horror – limited Internet access), local food (including the best quattro fromaggi I have ever had), coffee (often in the very early hours of the morning!!), and the wonderful cultural offerings near Catania. I spent a number of very happy days with Placido in his little car maneuvering in and out of traffic to and from many wonderful places where he was a very gifted and very proud tour guide. I saw a play in Syracuse. I went walking and sightseeing in Naxos. I had a wonderful lunch on the seaside at Taormina. It was a cultural experience to remember. I will be forever grateful to Placido and Gillian for making my visit to Sicily a once in a lifetime experience.

 It was easy to get to know Placido. He was unafraid to speak his mind, especially when he was cross with you (as he was when I took too long to submit my lecture to him). He wore his heart on his sleeve. We spoke a lot and about a lot of things while travelling in his car, including about personal matters. He was a patient and sympathetic listener, offering sage advice, especially when discussing my worries about balancing work and family life and trying to earn tenure in an environment uninterested in and often dismissive of my research on Sidgwick and utilitarianism. His kindness and sympathy helped very much to alleviate my concerns.

 We have lost a dedicated scholar and teacher and a kind and cultured colleague. We are worse off without Placido, from the point of view (if I may say so) of the Universe. Rest in peace, Placido.

Anthony Skelton

London, Ontario

July 2022

John SKORUPSKI

Emeritus Professor

Saint Andrews University (UK)

Placido and I first met through our shared enthusiasm for Henry Sidgwick. The meetings Placido organised at the University of Catania were not just intellectual highlights; they were sheer pleasure. There was something very special about discussing Sidgwick in a place so distant, and so different from, the Cambridge where Sidgwick spent much of his life. 

 What brought the participants together was admiration for Sidgwick’s penetration, his determined search for truth in ethics, irrespective of preconception and dogma. Indeed the greatest contributor to the philosophical tone of these meetings was Sidgwick’s own character; the ‘pure white light’ of his style as Brand Blanshard characterised it in his book, Four Reasonable Men. (The other three were Marcus Aurelius, John Stuart Mill and Ernest Renan – a fitting company for Sidgwick). Sidgwickean integrity can make its impact not only in Cambridge and Catania but anywhere in the world where there are people who can appreciate it. With the help of Roger Crisp and Bart Schulz, Placido published the essays on Sidgwick that were delivered at these meetings in two splendid volumes, in which each essay appears in both English and Italian. These volumes make a major contribution to Sidgwick’s spreading reputation. Among them is Placido’s own carefully considered essay on theism as a model of reconciliation.

 As well as being a great Sidgwickian Placido was a great Sicilian who loved his country, as my wife Barbara and I came to know. We stayed with him and his wife Gillian in his splendid home, Villa Bucolo on the flanks of Mount Etna. From there he took us on many trips to the lovely countryside and ancient sites of Sicily, not least Catania and Etna itself.

 The Sicilian and the Sidgwickian – an unexpected combination united in a gentleman and a philosopher: Placido Bucolo. We mourn his passing.

John and Barbara Skorupski

Gillian Bucolo 

his beloved wife

Placido and family

Placido was a true Gemini – inquisitive, intelligent, artistic, artful and a great thinker. He could be listening to you while watching the news on T.V., reading a newspaper article on his tablet and analysing a dozen important questions to be solved before tomorrow! If you had a discussion with him, his mastery  of words and ability to use them would persuade you that he was right and you were wrong.  He was highly competitive and expected perfection from those around him whether students or colleagues, whether friends or family. He loved to be the centre of attention and surround himself with people who could stimulate him intellectually, creatively and spiritually. Everything was a challenge and he would put on his armour, get on his horse and gallop into the lists. I think he imagined himself to be the reincarnation of Sir Lancelot, Ben Hur, Dartagnan or Sandokan because he still watched videos of his heros or read books from his childhood. Placido’s hair became white but he never grew old! 

 He relaxed listening to classical music, knew all the operas (his collection of records is next to none), he enjoyed singing the arias as a baritone, having taken singing lessons from Maestro Santonicito, composer and  conductor of the Catania Bellini Opera House until he died in 1977. His other hobby was tennis. With a group of friends he founded the Bucolo Tennis Club at our house in the country.  A game of tennis was conducted like a battle for supremacy of the tennis court. I could  hear the noise of the racquets hitting the ball over  the net but that was accompanied by accusations of cheating and stealing points and insults in a colourful language which made my ears burn. Match ended, however, everything was forgiven and forgotten over  a glass of spumante and almond cakes on the terrace before going home to lunch! 

 Happiness was having a dozen projects going at the same time. He juggled working at the University with rehearsing a play to be staged in various theatres and schools with the collaboration of Catania University and Lions, editing poems for the annual Poetry Festival held in Biancavilla Theatre with aspiring poets from all over Sicily taking part, organizing a Lions, Club meeting to raise money for charity including missionaries in Africa  and making notes for an article (most probably about his beloved English philosophers). Placido loved England, its traditions, its past,  its stiff upper lip and everything it represented and looked forward to our three month stay in our cottage in the village of Adderbury.

He was a non-conformist and proud of it! He enjoyed being different. He did not need a big expensive, flashy car – it was enough to have an efficient old one which would get him where he wanted to go. His friends and relatives were very important to him and he would remember birthdays and name days and phone regularly to make sure everyone was all right. Although he recognised one must look to the future,he was a hoarder and obsessed by memories of the past, his beloved, very religious grandmother, his poetess aunt, the house where he grew up. He was deeply religious, could quote the Gospel, took Saint Paul as his role model, belonged to a local church Bible class and watched morning Mass on TV regularly.

 Placido should never have retired, He still had so much to give, The last two years  with Covid and lockdown were particularly difficult for him. He no longer seemed to find anything stimulating  and channelled his energy into his tennis mornings or looking after the pets and the garden. Peter Pan had lost his ability to fly.

 It is only now on reading the memories of his colleagues that I realize my husband was two different people. I immediately think of the two headed god, Janus, one face looking forward, one face looking back, one pessimistic, the other optimistic, the philosopher looking to the future, the man holding on to  the past.

 I wish to thank everyone for their thoughts and memories of Placido. Reading them as you posted them was very emotional but at the same time made us feel very proud. Each of you picked out a particular aspect of a somewhat complex character and expressed it with gentleness and respect, revealing the other side of an apparently ordinary person. Robert Shaver’s summing up was perfect – “Placido was so at home in his world and happy to show this world to another: he was exactly where he wanted to be and always had been”. Thank you all from our hearts.

Angela Bucolo 

his only daughter

You’re never ready when you lose a loved one, especially when it’s so sudden. But even more so when you lose a parent.

You think that just because they are your parents, they are going to live forever and always be there.

It’s such a shock and I feel ‘unhinged’ as though I have lost one of the few certainties in my life. You are left with all the memories and, as time goes by, the fear they going to fade and disappear becomes stronger. So you try to find a way to hang on to them.

This is were you all come in.

 With your lovely contributions, by sharing your personal experiences of him, you have given us something tangible to hang on to. The warmth of the words chosen to describe my dad will be with us forever and we shall always be grateful.

My dad was an idealist, always striving for perfection, he could be very strict, rigid and unflexible whenever he did something, writing a book, directing a play or organising a congress! He wanted everything to be as perfect as he had visualised it. This obviously came at a cost and not without disappointments. However, his unwavering faith and the belief that there is always something good to be gained in every situation, helped him to quickly adapt and forgive but….never forget! He remembered EVERYTHING in minute detail, much to our chagrin as we were never allowed to slide over our mistakes!

 An elephant never forgets! He used to get quite upset with us when we had no recollection of certain  past events especially those linked to the trips we took.

He used to spend months organising our holiday schedule, in a no-internet era, the bible of holiday makers was the Michelin Guide which never left his sight! Everything was done over the phone so all the bookings were done by me as he was convinced I was very good at languages (we did have several misunderstandings with hoteliers and b&b owners).The trip itself, which lasted about a month, usually August in the sweltering heat, was on a very tight schedule, chock-a-block with must-see places to visit and unmissable things to see, all of course on foot under a scorching sun.

 Understandably, the troops were sometimes lagging behind and on very few occasions tried mutiny which, of course, was soon quashed and ranks were re-established. It was really stressful being the navigator in the passenger seat. You can’t imagine what would happen if we took a wrong turning!

 The child within us had many chances to come out and have fun. My father would go on all the rides in Euro Disney and Disney World, he was keen to see as much as possible at the Epcot Centre and Universal Sudios. The memories of the trip to America are my fondest, a real adventure full of lovely surprises! The super-friendly people, the huge portions, the vastness of the space around us, the excitment of actually being somewhere like The Niagara Falls or The Empire State Building.

 I have been to so many wonderful places and I have only my father to thank as he was exceptional when it came to choosing the routes and the best hotels and the most interesting places to visit. These are my best memories, unique, packed with beautiful art and history pleasing to the eye, mind and soul.

 However, of all the places I’m sure that at the moment he has chosen to be somewhere in England, more specifically in the Cotwolds he was so fond of, driving around in his cherished Mini or walking around the gardens at Blenheim Palace. In fact, he is surely enjoying all those places and activities he loved so much without carrying the burden of his thoughts and without that heaviness of heart caused by the realisation that the politics of the modern world had somewhat failed us thus making the fate of the human lot uncertain. Yet, he is once again where he wanted to be, reunited with all those he loved and who loved him,  surrounded by that Light of the World which he believed would always bring hope in our darkest hour.